考虑消费者从众特性的动态定价研究

面对掌握大量信息的消费者,厂商需考虑多方因素制定价格策略。研究运用经典的博弈模型,讨论不同消费者特性情况下厂商的定价机制。模型按从众特性和等待特性将消费者分为六类,并引入一个价格偏差变量,分析各类型消费者比例变化对厂商定价和利润的影响。结果显示,一般情况下降价幅度、消费者期望购买总数量和期望销售利润都随着反从众消费者比例的增大而增加。最后扩展分析了效益贴现率,反从众消费者比例和短视型消费者比例三因素对厂商总利润的影响,研究认为效益贴现率和从众消费者比例较高时,厂商利润会随着短视型消费者比例的降低而有所提高。因此,为使收益最大化,厂商在制定定价策略时需同时考虑贴现因素和消费者行为特性。     

A rational random behaviour model of choice

In this paper, a multinomial-Dirichlet-geometric model of consumer brand choice is developed. This individual-level stochastic choice model is derived as an extension of Theil's theory of rational random behaviour. These behavioural assumptions permit modelling of changes in likelihood of purchase as consumers are confronted with environmental factors whose occurrence and exact nature could not be anticipated at the planning stage of a shopping trip. Moreover, the model allows for uncertainties about future events which might affect actual choice to be built into the choice process alongside a traditional choice model which reflects preferences and/or utilities (and potential uncertainties surrounding them). Empirical results using consumer diary purchase panel data indicate a strong superiority of the model developed compared with previous models which assume stationary preference vectors.     

基于MAS协作机制的动态计算资源调度模型

针对网格环境的自治性、动态性、分布性和异构性等特征.提出基于多智能体系统(Mutil Agent System,MAS)博弈协作的资源动态分配和任务调度模型,建立了能够反映供求关系的网格资源调度模型和任务求解算法,证明了资源分配博弈中Nash均衡点的存在性、唯一性和Nash均衡解,该方法能够利用消费者agent的学习和协商能力,考虑和引入消费者的心理行为,使得消费者的资源申请和任务调度具有较高的合理性和有效性.实验结果表明,资源调度算法不但可以有效减少不必要的延迟,而且在响应时间的平滑性、吞吐率及资源利用率方面比传统算法要好,从而使得整个资源的供需合理、负载均衡.     

A capacitated firm’s pricing strategies for strategic consumers with different search costs

This paper studies pricing strategies of a seller with budget constraints facing two types of strategic consumers with different search costs, and proposes three pricing strategies to motivate all consumers to visit his shop. These are the basic price strategy, differentiated compensation strategy and an improved differentiated compensation strategy. Based on the rational expectations paradigm, we characterize the rational expectations equilibrium in the game and propose a basic pricing strategy. In order to address the interplay between price and demand, we further propose a differentiated compensation strategy to improve the basic model. We then compare the differentiated compensation strategy to the basic pricing strategy when both are feasible. We find that selection of the optimal strategy is independent of composition of consumers but is dependent on the seller’s budget level and the difference between the two search costs. If the budget is large enough and the difference between the search costs is small enough, a differentiated compensation strategy can further improve the seller’s profitability. In addition to these findings, we first propose an improved differentiated compensation strategy to further enhance the firm’s profit. We find that the optimal strategy is to implement the improved differentiated compensation strategy when all three strategies are feasible. Interestingly, the firm may benefit from paying a high compensation to the consumers.     

考虑策略型消费者和退货的零售商降价促销决策研究

基于零售商降价促销问题,引入策略型消费者,考虑到异质性消费者有可能对商品不满意,构建两期决策模型,旨在从退货和价格路径优化两方面提高零售商利润。研究给出(不)允许退货时,零售商面对策略型消费者的定价建议,指出零售商制定价格要在一定程度上参考商品类型。订货量相同时,给出策略型消费者降低零售商的期望利润的条件;面对短视型或者策略型消费者时,允许退货可在特定条件下提升零售商利润。消费者退货成本越高,对策略型消费者消极影响的抑制作用越明显,零售商的利润增长越显著。最后,通过数值算例分析了在两种退货决策以及不同退货成本下产品类型对零售商定价的影响,以及退货措施对策略型消费者消极影响的作用。     

基于策略型消费者的电商平台折扣销售期定价策略研究

电商平台折扣销售期的双重折扣现象激发了巨大的消费需求,本文构建了具有折扣销售期的电商平台和商家的斯坦伯格博弈模型,研究了在电商平台不提供消费者返利和提供消费者返利的情况下商家和电商平台的最优定价策略。从消费者效用出发,结合最优化方法和博弈论,力图为商家和电商平台的决策提供参考。研究结果表明:(1)在电商平台不提供返利时,消费者的策略性越高,正常销售期的价格越高,折扣率越低。(2)当电商平台给消费者提供返利时,正常销售期的价格会升高,而折扣销售期的价格会降低,差异化定价现象愈加明显。(3)当消费者的麻烦成本高于某一阈值时,电商平台提供顾客返利时的收益相比不提供顾客返利时更高且最优利润随着消费者的麻烦成本的增加而增加。(4)拓展部分考虑了过高麻烦成本造成的消费者流失,发现适当的提高消费者的麻烦成本能增加平台和商家的收益,但是当超过一定的范围,会引起用户流失,反而损害双方的利润。     

Productive public expenditures, expectation formations and nonlinear dynamics

In this paper, we investigate the dynamic properties of an overlapping generations’ model with capital accumulation and publicly funded inventions under three different expectations: perfect foresight, myopic expectations and adaptive expectations. We show that considering productive public expenditures in the model will increase the dimension of the dynamical system. To study the dynamic behavior of a high-dimensional dynamical system, we focus on the case when the elasticity of publicly funded invention to output is small and approximate the system by using a one-dimensional dynamical system. This approximation method provides an efficient way to rigorously prove the existence of chaos in high-dimensional dynamical systems. We show that when agents are perfectly foresighted, there exists a unique, nontrivial steady state which is a global attractor. Cycles or even chaos may occur under myopic and adaptive expectations when the inter-temporal elasticity of substitution of consumption is large enough. Furthermore, we find that the impact of fiscal policy is sensible to the expectation formation.     

考虑传统双渠道和BOPS双渠道的消费者和零售商决策研究

本论文在全渠道零售的BOPS模式下,考虑允许退货研究消费者渠道选择问题。首先研究传统双渠道和实施BOPS的双渠道下的消费者和零售商决策。然后加入退货设定,对二者的决策进行重新研究和对比分析。研究发现:不考虑退货的情况下,引入BOPS模式能够提升实体店对零售商及消费者的吸引力;退货情况下,引入BOPS使消费者更愿意选择线下购买和销售,但不一定总能带来销售总量的增加;实施BOPS时,退货允许让零售商更愿意在实体店销售,同时消费者的购买渠道选择也变得复杂。     

Expectations equilibria with dispersed forecasts

A dispersion condition for traders' forecasts in a general equilibrium model with uncertainty and asymmetric information yields improved results for some (microeconomic) situations in which rational expectations equilibria need not exist. The hypothesis of suitably dispersed forecasts implies that consumers' aggregate excess demand is a continuous function and therefore a fixed point theorem may be applied to obtain a price vector (for each state of the world) such that markets clear. Stronger assumptions give existence of approximately rational expectations equilibria and the convergence of forecast distributions to rational expectations.     

Skewness Term-Structure Tests

In this paper, we conduct skewness term-structure tests to check whether the temporal structure of risk-neutral skewness is consistent with rational expectations. Because risk-neutral skewness is substantially mean reverting, skewness shocks should decay quickly and risk-neutral skewness of more distant option should display the rationally expected smoothing behaviour. Using an equilibrium asset and option-pricing model in a production economy under jump diffusion with stochastic jump intensity, we derive this elasticity analytically. In an empirical application of the model using more than 20 years of data on S&P500 index options, we find that this elasticity turns out to be different than suggested under rational expectations – smaller on the short end (underreaction) and larger on the long end (overreaction) of the ‘skewness curve’.     

The effects of sensitization and habituation in durable goods markets

We develop a model to study the impact of changes in price sensitivity on the firm as it introduces multiple generations of a durable product where unit costs are a convex function of quality. We incorporate the psychological processes of sensitization and habituation into a model of discretionary purchasing of replacement products motivated by past experience. When price sensitivity decreases with each purchase (sensitization), the myopic firm offers a higher quality product at a much higher price with each generation. When price sensitivity increases with each purchase (habituation), the myopic firm engages in price skimming. When sensitization is followed by habituation, the myopic firm eventually provides higher quality than the market is willing to pay for, leading to a steep drop-off in sales and profits. The actions of the forward-looking firm depend on the discount rate. A firm with a low discount rate builds its customer base before offering a higher quality and higher priced product. In contrast, a firm with a high discount rate quickly increases price and quality following the same path to falling profits of the myopic firm. These results provide insight into the firm and consumer behaviors underlying the phenomenon of “performance oversupply” identified in the innovation literature.     

消费者预防在线销售掺假行为的博弈模型及最优策略

建立了描述消费者与带掺假行为的在线零售商之间相互博弈的双层规划模型,其中消费者为领导者,在线零售商为随从者.消费者预防在线销售掺假行为的两种策略是进行商品品质检查和采用延期付款,在线零售商则依据消费者的预防策略决定是否销售掺假商品.根据消费者和在线零售商的可能采用的策略,对模型分四种情形展开分析与讨论,并分别在不同情形下得到了消费者与在线零售商的最优决策.结果表明,消费者延期付款的最优时间和进行商品品质检查能有效遏制在线零售商掺假行为.     

Stochastic Policy Design in a Learning Environment with Rational Expectations

In this paper, we present a method for using rational expectations in a stochastic linear-quadratic optimization framework in which the unknown parameters are updated through a learning scheme. We use the QZ decomposition as suggested by Sims (Ref. 1) to solve the rational expectations part of the model. The parameter updating is done with the Kalman filter and the optimal control is calculated using the covariance matrix of the uncertain parameter.     

面向电子商务的应用——基于多Agen t的消费者需求代理系统

首先根据电子商务环境下消费者需求的特点,在对多A gen t技术论述的基础上,建立了基于多A gen t的消费者需求代理系统.接着对系统具体工作流程进行了深入分析:先针对不同消费者建立相应的用户模型,以便为不同消费者提供效用最大化的产品或产品服务的组合,然后采用协商型A gen t,完成网上产品或服务的交易.最后提出了基于遗传算法的协商谈判策略,以提高消费者需求代理系统的协商能力.     

Relating brand confusion to ad similarities and brand strengths through image data analysis and classification

Advances in Data Analysis and Classification - Brand confusion occurs when a consumer is exposed to an advertisement (ad) for brand A but believes that it is for brand B. If more consumers are...     

双寡头时间限制型免费试用策略竞争分析

目前,提供限时免费试用已经成为软件厂商降低消费者对产品质量不确定性及促进新产品扩散的常见做法。现有研究多局限于垄断情况,对现实中常出现的寡头竞争情况鲜有探讨。在考虑消费者学习异质性的基础上,基于Hotelling模型研究了双寡头企业免费试用策略博弈均衡及其影响因素。结果表明:(1)如果两家企业的期望用户体验都比较好,都应该提供免费试用;如果期望用户体验都比较差,都不提供。(2)否则,均衡结果进一步取决于消费者对他们之间水平差异的敏感性。如果很不敏感,则两家企业必须采取相反的免费试用提供策略,并且只有当它们的期望用户体验差距很大时,优势企业一定提供而劣势企业不提供;否则,保持相反即可。如果非常敏感,则两家企业只需在免费试用提供策略上保持一致即可。(3)消费者完全学习软件所需时间越长,两家企业“都不提供”和“只需一致”的可能性增大,而“都提供”和“必定相反”的可能性降低。这是对免费试用策略竞争问题进行的首次探索,所得结果对相关理论研究具有补充和促进作用,也能为相关实践提供科学的决策依据。     

考虑消费者行为转化的零售商两阶段动态定价研究

考虑消费者呈现的不同行为特征,将其划分为两类:策略型和短视型。不同类型的消费者对同一产品会给出差别估价,假设这一估价呈随机分布,研究存在消费者行为转化的产品两阶段动态定价问题。引入消费者剩余对策略型和短视型消费者的市场响应特征进行描述,考虑贴现率,建立两阶段动态定价模型,分析不同类型消费者的差别决策过程,并且采用逆推法求解动态定价模型,得到最优价格策略。研究表明消费者期望购买数量与降价幅度都和转化率成负相关,此外,通过对比考虑转化和不考虑转化的两种情形下零售商总的期望利润,发现如果零售商没有考虑转化率而仅根据市场初期调查的消费者构成来进行产品定价将会给零售商带来损失,并且两种情形的利润差值随转化率的升高呈先上升后下降的变化趋势。     

消费者异质性下基础产品及其附加品的供应链定价策略研究

建立一个由制造商和销售商组成的二级供应链模型,在销售商向消费者销售制造商基础产品的同时提供可选附加品的供应链多产品定价背景下研究了制造商及销售商的定价策略。以消费者对附加品价值增值存在的异质性将基础产品及其附加品的消费市场细分为基础产品单独消费市场及产品共同消费市场。基于市场细分比例以及附加品价值增值程度,讨论了不同条件下制造商及销售商的定价策略以及所形成的供应链定价均衡,分析了产品定价均衡与市场细分比例、附加品价值增值程度之间的关系。     

Discovering heterogeneous consumer groups from sales transaction data

We propose a demand estimation method to discover heterogeneous consumer groups. The estimation requires only historical sales data and product availability. Consumers belonging to different segments possess heterogeneous preferences and, in turn, heterogeneous substitution behaviors. For such consumers, the latent class consumer choice model can better represent their heterogeneous purchasing behaviors. In the latent class choice model, there are multiple consumer segments, and the segment types are not observable to the retailer. The expectation-maximization (EM) method is developed to jointly estimate the arrival rate and the parameters of the choice model. The developed method enables a simple estimation procedure by treating the observed data as incomplete observations of the consumer type along with consumer’s first choice. The first choice is the choice before the substitution effects occur. We test the procedure on simulated data sets. The results show that the procedure effectively detects heterogeneous consumer segments that have significant market presence.     

A simulation of the impacts of dynamic price management for perishable foods on retailer performance in the presence of need-driven purchasing consumers

Numerous studies have investigated dynamic pricing for perishable products. The models have been designed to determine an optimal pricing structure and improve retailer performance. Previous studies on pricing models for perishable products have considered various assumptions of consumer demand and purchasing behaviour from deterministic and stochastic price-dependent demands to myopic and strategic consumer purchasing behaviour. They have not, however, considered consumer demand in reaction to a situation where the display stock of a particular product has different qualities (such as shelf-life) and prices available at the same time. This is particularly applicable in the analysis of dynamic pricing models for perishable foods. In this paper, we investigate the impact of frequency of discount during a product’s selling period on retailer performance, by considering changes in consumer purchasing behaviour in response to the display stock of a particular food product having different remaining shelf-life and prices. On the basis of a literature review and data obtained from interviews with food retailers, a simulation study is performed to compare the performance of different pricing policies. The results demonstrate the benefits gained by adopting more dynamic price policies.